Blasphemy
by Cisselah
Summary: Adam is thirteen when his mother dies and leaves him alone in the world, hunted by monsters only Adam can see (and a voice that keeps making snarky comments inside his head). Maybe he belongs in the crazy-house after all. (No slash, AU)


**~*Blasphemy*~**

**_By: Cisselah_**

~*-.-*~

_Warning: _

_Christians, Jews and Muslims,_

_terribly sorry to disappoint,_

_but angels are douchebags._

**_~*-.-*~_**

_Tell us, _the nurses say (his mother was a nurse, he remembers). _Tell us what happened. Tell us what's wrong._

Screaming. Broken fingers bent the wrong way. Laughing. Empty sea-green eyes that stare at him accusingly. Your fault, they say, your fault!

_We can't help you if you don't tell us. Please, will you just talk to us? _The nurses' eyes are wide and open, like a hole he could fill with all his secrets and memories that no human being should ever have to bear.

They can't help him. Nobody can help him. He can still hear it - almost feel it - in the edge of his consciousness. Whispering. Warning. _Don't tell them a thing, they'll think you're crazy. _A voice in the back of his head whispers. He can't tell if it's real or not. A lost whisper from his good sense perhaps. Or maybe a voice that comes from nothing (a trick his brain plays on him).

He can't tell.

He's thirteen years old and all he knows is white walls, plastic smiles and blood splattering over the walls and floor.

He doesn't know what's real or not.

~*-.-*~

He can't remember his name anymore. He's sure he had one at some point, but it has been wash away in images of empty, green eyes and smeary, red smiles. Just like everything else.

Some nights he wakes up screaming, trashing and screaming himself raw until the nurses unlocks his door and wrestles him to the ground. In the darkness his eyes are deceiving and the shadows plays cruel tricks on him. He fights against them, and sometimes he even fights against his memories until it becomes so much (too much) that they stick a needle into one of his thin arms and pumps him full of drugs.

Those nights are the worse ones.

Those nights are the ones he hates.

~*-.-*~

The days blur together, all white walls and mumbling crazies. Soon he can't tell the difference from when the day ends and the day begins. It doesn't matter anyway, all days are the same. The same sterile, white walls. The same nurses and patients (inmates). The same food and medicine and God damn it if it isn't the same 'soothing' words being repeated again and again and again like some freakin' song stuck on replay.

Sometimes it feels like he's going madder and madder for every minute he spends here. Like the walls have somehow sucked up all the craziness and now it's slowly leaking out, poisoning the air with crazy.

_Don't tell them anything. _The Voice commands (the voice that shatters glass and hurts his head, the voice only he can hear).

He doesn't. They wouldn't believe him even if he did. Not that it matters, because he hasn't said a word in the seventy-three days he's been here (or the four days he spent at the real hospital before they moved him). He hasn't spoken a single word and he won't, _ever. _

The Voice made sure of that.

He counts the days that passes by.

Soon he loses count.

~*-.-*~

He meets her on a sunny day, one of the very few he has. It purely by coincident he decides to sit down next to her on the couch. He's tired and his knee hurts from where Warden Wilkins kicked him the day before (when he spilled his milk all over the Warden's pants). She doesn't as much as look up from the Rubik's cube she's working on when he sits down next to her.

She's old, older than anyone he's ever met before. Her hair is a white-grey rat's nest that hangs over her eyes and ears. Her skin is wrinkled and she's so small, bent under the heavy burden of age. Still, her gnarled fingers are quick when they flit over the cube, twisting and turning at a speed that makes his head spin as he listens to her raspy mutterings.

Her name is Maggie, but they call her Mad-Mags. He doesn't know why she's here, because as far as he can tell she's absolutely harmless. Just a muttering old lady that smiles a lot and obsesses over the way her dress wrinkles when she sits down.

The other patients avoid her, but for some reason he can't. There's something about here, this inner light that everyone else in this sterile place of white walls lacks. She's real (good and bad), more real than any of the others.

They sit side by side, the old women who talks to much and the boy who doesn't talk at all.

~*-.-*~

Somewhere around day eighty-eight (eighty-nine? Ninety? He's lost count) he begins to skip dinner. It begins as an experiment (just simple curiosity) to see if anyone noticed.

They don't.

Around day ninety-five he's stopped eating at all.

~*-.-*~

The fever hits him on a black Thursday (at least he thinks it's a Thursday, could as well be a Sunday for all he knows). It plagues him with images he knows can't be real. Of his mother cooking him chicken soup, stroking his hair with soft hands and softer smiles. Of his mother dying, red blood pumping up from her neck and arms, spilling out from the thousand marks the monster's put on her body. He sees sharp teeth and hungry smiles - putrid voices that mocks him for being such a coward.

Other times he hears The Voice again (the stern, no-nonsense, do-as-I-say-or-else voice). It's not mocking or gentle, only indifferent, and somehow that's even worse. It cuts his eyes like mirror glass and he scream (high loud pained) in utter terror as he slaps trembling hands over his ears, trying to block out a voice that will never leave.

It takes four guards to wrestle him down.

Warden Wilkins spits on his twitching shoes.

~*-.-*~

He doesn't know when he started to think of the hospital as a prison. In his mind, all nurses are guards, the patients – inmates - and the locked doors with the padded cells are naked cells with iron bars. It even has its own routine (which isn't much, but still...). Mostly it's about sleeping, eating and taking meds, but he can't bother to care anymore (not after the sixth pill they forced into him this morning).

_It'll make the voices go away, _the nurses reassure him (but their words are hollow).

_I'll never go away. _The Voice tells him.

_Mommy Mommy Mommy Mommy._

_Red blood splattering all over the wall. Blood smeared grins and glittering eyes. Empty sea-green eyes that stares at him accusingly._

_Your fault. Your fault. Your fault._

_Mommy Mommy Mommy Mommy._

He doesn't like the pills, they make everything so much louder.

~*-.-*~

Sometimes he lies in bed and remembers things. The feeling of the sun on his skin. The smell of fresh pancakes in the morning. The sound of her voice when she tells him she loves him.

He remembers the first (and last) time he asked her about his dad.

_He's name was John. _She said and pursed her lips into a sour expression that made her look so breakable he wanted to cry. _That's all you need to know. _

That night he had laid awake in his bed, listening to his mother sobbing her heart out in the room next to his. She had tried to be silent, but the sounds of her heartbreaking sobs had drifted in through the door.

He never asked her again.

He remembers other things too. Things that happened so long ago they can't possibly be his (or things that hasn't yet happened). He remembers having brothers (although he's fairly sure he has none), a father (he doesn't have a father) that he loved more than anything. He remembers light and morningstars and fighting together until...

He doesn't want to remember the rest.

Red blood. So much of it (it has repainted the kitchen, he wonders what Mom will say). Steel hands holding him still as sharp hands digging into him, digging into his flesh and bones and blood and carving (ripping it away) only to bring it up up up up to pink, red lips.

The woman's blood (his mother's) spreads over the open surface of the kitchen floor.

A voice (The Voice) whispering in his head: _Slay the abominations. Erase them. Smite them from earth. Kill them. Kill them now._

He doesn't want to remember any more. (_sitting on the floor, holding her cold hand as the front door bursts open and men in uniforms and with guns fills in)_

He can't help but do.

~*-.-*~

It's somewhere around day one hundred forty-seven when he's had enough.

Enough of this nut-house.

Enough of these meds.

Enough of the voices-nightmares-white-prison-walls.

Enough. Enough. Enough. Enough. Enough.

He slits his wrists with the sharp edge of a razor (stolen from Warden Wilkins overnight bag that he keeps for the days he spends with his mistress).

He nearly bleeds out on the concrete floor.

~*-.-*~

They take him away and pump him full of drugs.

He stares blankly at the wall for ages.

He's dull and bleak like a washed out shirt.

When they bring him back he's even deader than he was.

~*-.-*~

It's Maggie that brings him back in the end. One day she sits down next to him and pulls out a torn packet of crayons from underneath her dress. She smiles at him toothlessly (a kind smile that reeks of honesty) and places it tenderly in his hands as he stares at her blankly. He looks down at their hands, an old wrinkled one and a pale grayish ghost.

She squeezes his hands warmly and when he looks up she's silent for the first time since he's met her, staring at him with celestial blue eyes that could be confused for a piece of heaven. He looks at her in confusion (because he can't remember what he's supposed to do, what is he supposed to do?)

"D-raw" says Old Maggie with her gnarled fingers and toothless smile.

One of the nurses walks by (too closely) and she pulls back, returning to her Rubik's cube like nothing ever happened.

He stares blankly down at the pack of crayons in his hands. He tightens his grip on them and pushes them against his chest.

That night in his room is spent drawing strange shapes and twisted shadows over the padded walls.

The next morning Warden Wilkins throws a fit at the sight of it and orders a nurse to wash it away.

~*-.-*~

He spends the day painting in his room. A nurse from the prison guard gives him new crayons (these ones with more variation in color) but he keeps the scrunched-up, torn package of crayons safely tucked away underneath his pillow, unable to throw it away.

Every night he fills the walls with images from his scrambled memories. Shapes of light battling twisted shadows. The light reflecting of his mother's hair. Pale, dark eyes and bloodstained smiles. Gardens with unspeakable beauty (that he never seems to get just quite right).

Every morning Warden Wilkins washes it away.

Every night he paints it all over again.

~*-.-*~

It's day one hundred seventy-something when Warden Wilkins looses what little patience he has left. This morning was spent trying to wash away the glowing out print of a man in a leatherjacket, and Warden Wilkins decides he's had enough.

He finds the boy in the bathrooms, washing the smudged colors from his hands. The boy looks up, his eyes hooded but flashing briefly in fear at the sight of the Warden.

Without a word the older man has crossed the room and yanked the boy away from the sink, thick hands wrapping around the back of the hospital gown. He doesn't say a word (doesn't fight it) because he knows it will do no good. Warden Wilkins is in a mood, and anything he does will only make it worse. He continues to not-fight all the way until Warden Wilkins shoves his head down the toilet and he chokes on the lukewarm water.

All thoughts of not-fighting abandoned, he lashes out with thin arms, kicks out with his legs in an attempt to make the Warden let go, to breathe dammit, because Warden Wilkins is holding him under too long - too much - too hard. He claws at the toilet seat, trying to pull himself up (but he can't). He can't hold his breath much longer. His lungs are screaming, his blood is pounding, his whole body is screaming _oxygen, oxygen, please!._

He can't breathe. He can't breathe. _He can't breathe!_

He slaps the older man's hands, tries to loosen the ironclad grip the Warden has on his neck (but he can't he can't he can't he's just as useless as _that night). _It's no use. Warden Wilkins wants to teach him a lesson, but he doesn't seem to realize that the younger boy can't take it much longer (or maybe he realizes and just don't care).

Warden Wilkins is going to kill him (just like redsmiles-madeyes-wicked-grin-paincoldpain hurt Mommy).

He screams under water, bubbles whistling past his nose up towards the surface (he envies them). He screams until there's no air left in his lungs and he has no choice but to inhale a mouthful of water that turns into a cough that turns into more water sliding down his lungs.

He remembers a face from a long time ago (a boy from his street, he thinks, but isn't sure) that looks at him in morbid fascination. _Drowning is the best way to go. _The face says. He remembers agreeing.

He was an idiot.

Drowning is by far the worse way to go.

He can't breathe (oh God let me breathe, let me breathe, please, I promise to be good, I promise to be a good boy!).

His body shudders. His eyes are open and wide as his hands drains of their strength and turns into dead weight. They slide off Warden Wilkins arms, hitting the dirty toilet seat on their way down.

It's silent. It's dark.

And then there's a horrible light that burns his skin (what little he can feel from his drowsy state of mind) and a voice (The Voice! The Voice!) that's not gentle or indifferent but mad (so horribly mad) as it manages to growl and hiss and snarl and scream at the same time the same words.

_Mine._

~*-.-*~

When he wakes up he's surprised.

He didn't expect to wake up at all.

He blinks owlishly. His eyelashes are lined with tiny bits of water and he's soaked to the bone and he _hurts, _worse than he ever hurt before. He feels raw and washed out, like someone took a brush and a bar of soap and scrubbed him red from the inside out.

It takes a few seconds to sit up and another few to see the body.

He survived the Warden's attempt at drowning.

The Warden wasn't as lucky.

He should be disgusted, because any sane boy of thirteen (fourteen?) years would be. Any sane boy would flinch at the sight of those empty sockets of torn flesh that Warden Wilkins's eyes have become. Any sane boy would retch at the smell of burning flesh lingering in the air.

Any sane boy.

But not him.

He's not a sane boy. He's not even sure he's a boy anymore. He wonders if maybe Warden Wilkins had realized that too and that was why the man shoved his head down the toilet. He's all alone in the entire world, and everybody he comes close to dies (horribly).

_I won't let them hurt you. _The Voice whispers. It tries to seem gentle (it really does) but the Voice isn't like anything else he's ever heard. The Voice will (maybe) never sound soft and gentle, because the Voice vibrates with the silver tunes of pure power and pure light. It sounds like death, swords clashing, blood spilling, war songs rising towards heaven.

It sounds like judge, jury and executioner.

It sounds like death.

_Who are you? _The boy wonders.

There's only silence so long he starts to think the Voice won't answer.

The boy stands up and starts to make his way towards the sink, listening to the unfamiliar power that guides his limbs and legs. Down the hall the sounds of frantic footsteps are closing in. The nurses will be here soon, he thinks as he turns the tap and water starts running.

_It's best you don't know kiddo, my family and I aren't exactly on the best terms right now. _The Voice says (his voice cold now, not gentle).

He shudders and nods and continues to wash his hands.

~*-.-*~

They stuff him full of pills.

He's in a constant daze, day and night.

Sometimes he catches the nurses whispering in the corridor, glancing at him sideways with wide eyes.

He tries to tell them the Voice is gone (even said goodbye in that goodhearted, indifferent way of it's).

They stuff him full of more pills.

He's in constant daze, day and night.

They feed him more pills.

~*-.-*~

The nurse that brings him his pills has a horrible face. She's by far the ugliest nurse he's ever seen before. It's strange, because yesterday she was the prettiest one and today he can't look at her without wanting to drive a shard of glass through his eye.

He screams long and loud when she smiles at him (God, make her stop!).

She continues to smile even when the other nurses returns with the syringe.

~*-.-*~

_He wants to go home. _

He has no home to go to.

_His brothers will kill him._

His mother is already dead.

_He just wants them to stop fighting._

He just wants them to stop whispering.

_He wants to go home._

No more pills.

_No more memories._

~*-.-*~

The nurse with the ugly face has been joined by a man with the ugly face. The man is far less patient than the nurse and he lingers in the doorway when the boy is supposed to go to sleep, leering down at him with charcoal eyes that burns like burned out cinders.

Help me! The boy whispers in the dark.

Nobody helps him.

Nobody cares.

The next day the man and nurse are joined by a girl.

~*-.-*~

He shows Maggie to stay away from the ugly-faces. He shows her their true faces in smudged shapes on previously white paper. She nods and folds the drawings up, hiding them in her perfectly straight dress.

She's not as dumb as she plays, his Maggie. She knows not to show them to anyone.

She's much smarter than he is.

~*-.-*~

It's on the toilet break when the man makes his move. He grabs the boy's arm, wraps one big hand over the boy's mouth and starts to pull him towards the exit, ignoring the muffled screaming and trashing. He holds the boy's arms tight (too tight) and he doesn't let go even after he breaks it.

He laughs as the boy screams.

He doesn't laugh when the light hits him.

~*-.-*~

_Don't worry, I'll protect you. _

Somewhere along the way the Voice has become his friend.

_~*-.-*~_

More pills

more pills

more

more

more

pills

He takes them all.

~*-.-*~

Somewhere along the road, the ugly faces become normal occurrences.

_Make them go away, _he pleads to the Voice.

_Sorry kid, can't do that. _The Voice rasps out. _I've drawn enough attention as it is._

_~*-.-*~_

He doesn't know how long it's been since he was lucid enough to tell the difference between the things in his head and the things outside (a lot, he guesses). It would have been a lot longer, he muses, if not for the men in suits. They're the opposite of each other. One tall and slim and black, the other shorter and fatter and white. Their badges reads FDI (or maybe it read FBI), and dazedly he wonders why those letters feels familiar.

"Son, can you hear me?" the white one asks gently.

He stares at them blankly (He hears a lot of voices).

"It's no use, Bobby, the kid's riding the rainbow right now," the black one says.

Was he?

"Besides," the black one continues. "He hasn't said a word since the day he arrived"

He doesn't say a word during that visit, even though the men wheedle and needle and tries to make him talk. He can't, because an ugly-face stands grinning in the doorway, offers the two men a charming smile of sweetly spun sugar on their way out.

When they're alone, she spins around to pin him down with red nails that draws blood and hard hands that'll leave bruises for days.

"If you say a thing," she threatens. "I'll rip out your tongue and make you eat it"

~*-.-*~

_Nobody is going to hurt you, kid. _The Voice whispers. _I won't let them._

_I promise._

_~*-.-*~_

The second visit is about as eventful as the first. They come, they talk, they leave disappointed.

"If you need anything," the white man says with a frown. His mouth is turned down and he seems upset as he shoves a bright white new card into the boy's hands. "Call me, Adam"

When they leave, the nurse with the ugly face practically dances into his cell.

"Are you a good puppy?" she says in a childish sing-song voice. "Are you a good puppy? Yes, you are..."

He stares at her and takes his daily pills, his thoughts wandering to other directions.

Adam...

Is that his name?

~*-.-*~

The third visit is different. He hears them coming from the place in his room, three set of footsteps that makes the nurse smile with sugar-smug smile.

"I'll be back soon, little puppy, don't wait up," she laughs a laugh that makes his skin crawl.

She leaves and he's alone (but not for long).

They've brought a third man with them, younger than the other two but older than Adam. He has a mischievous face that reminds Adam of the Voice (or at least what he imagines the Voice would look like if it wasn't so busy pretending to be indifferent all the time) and green eyes that reminds him of blood smiles laughter screams.

He's frozen in his place.

"Hi, kid," the man says with a gentle smile that looks far too innocent on his mischievous face. "My name is Dean, you must be Adam. How are you feeling?"

Behind him the two men in suits exchanges despairing looks. Adam doesn't care. Dean's dressed in jeans and t-shirt and leatherjacket and he smells like gunpowder and leather, just like Adam's dad used to do that one time Adam met him (not a meeting he wants to remember). He's younger than in Adam's not-yet-memories, less tormented and bitter, but the memories associate him with strength and safety and regret and _God, Adam, I'm sorry. _

This is his brother.

This is his new home.

So instead of staring into nothing like he does everybody else, Adam lifts his sleeves up and shows his newly found brother (re-found? Does future memories count?) the cuts and scars and bruises that mars his arms.

The three men blanch, but whether it's from shock or horror, Adam can't tell.

"I'll be damned," the black man breathes out. "He actually listens to you"

Dean swallows thickly, his face flashing with an unknown emotion until he composes himself and tries to smile (it's a little to strained for a real smile).

"That bad, huh?" Worse. "Well... Eh... I know how you feel. I lost my mother when I was young too. It's only my dad, me and S- it's only my dad and me now" He tries to keep the smile on his face for another few seconds before he gives up, the almost-sound of his little brother's name bringing back bittersweet memories he prefers to keep buried.

"Sam" Adam says, because he knows (will know) how much Sam leaving hurts. His voice is raspy and dry from disuse, but the word echoes through the room with startling clarity, making Dean startle badly.

"How?!" he gasps. "How the hell do you know that name?" He leans forward, his eyes suddenly burning like hell's fire. The older white man reaches forward and grabs his older brother before the man tries to strangle him.

"Calm down," the man hisses.

"I'm not going to calm down, I'm going to find out why this freak knows my brother's name" He should have known better than to surprise Dean Winchester. The man had a lifelong vendetta against anything resembling even the smallest surprise (courtesy of all the times the monster came out of the closet, so to speak).

Dean wrestles up a wrinkly piece of paper form his pocket, shoving it under Adam's nose like it's a wanted alive-or-dead poster with his name on it.

"Tell me how you drew this. Tell me how the hell you know about my brother" It takes a while for Adam's eyes to refocus and when they do he wishes they didn't.

It's a drawing (where did he get that?). A very specific drawing of a man with a leather jacket. Adam's father.

John Winchester.

The name sparks a memory.

Red smiles. Dark fingers. Pain pain pain pain. A voice (not The Voice) whispering in his ear; _say this. say this. say this. This is the message._

He whimpers.

"Dean! That's enough!" the fat white man barks out and drags Dean away towards the door.

They're leaving... They can't leave! His brother can't leave him here, alone among the ugly-faces and darkness! He wants to go with him (he promises to be a good boy, he swears).

They can't leave. He has a message to deliver.

"8-6-6-9-0-1-3-3-3-6" Adam rasps out. The three men freeze at the door. "This is John Winchester. I can't be reached right now. If this is important, leave a message"

Dean turns around, his eyes stunned and his mouth opening but Adam cuts him off before he even has the chance to start talking.

"8-6-6-9-0-1-3-3-3-6. This is John Winchester. I can't be reached right now. If this is important, leave a message. 8-6-6-9-0-1-3-3-3-6. This is John Winchester. I can't be reached right now. If this is important, leave a message"

"That's Dad's phone number... and voicemail. You... Oh shit. You tried to call my Dad" His eyes are wide and his mouth is open. "You know my Dad"

"8-6-6-9-0-1-3-3-3-6. This is John Winchester. I can't be reached right now. If this is important, leave a message"

"You have a message for my dad?" At Adam's nod he leans forward eagerly. "What is it?"

"8-6-6-9-0-1-3-3-3-6. This is John Winchester. I can't be reached right now. If this is important, leave a message"

His brother stares.

~*-.-*~

On his way out Dean feels a thin hand wrap around his wrist. He glances back and meets a pair of sea green eyes (almost the same shade as his own).

"Don't leave me!" the kid rasps out.

"I won't," Dean lies and turns around to walk away, leaving the kid standing in the doorway, looking lost.

He doesn't know why his stomach turns the way it does.

Maybe it was the burrito he ate for breakfast.

~*-.-*~

The storm appears out of nowhere. Rain whips against the windows, the trees screeches and the old hospital groans as it brews above the town in an alarming rate.

_They've found me. _The Voice moans as they huddle together in a corner._ Two thousand years of running and they've finally found me, all because I had a moment of weakness._

Adam feels a tiny bit hurt. Am I a moment of weakness? He wonders but dismisses it when he feels his companions regret.

_Don't worry. _Adam whispers to his friend. _I'll keep you safe._

_Adam, don't. My brother is too dangerous. He'd tear you to pieces. _The Voice warns him.

_He'll tear you to pieces too. _Adam whispers as the storm increases in strength. He whimpers at the sound screaming that comes from the patients and nurses. _Run. Run while you still can._

_I can't leave you here. _The voice whispers back, guilt in his voice as he contemplates it already. Adam nearly smiles.

_Raphael won't hurt me. _He tells his friend confidently. _I'm much too pretty for that._

_Adam!_

_What? It's true, isn't it? Anyway, he'll breeze by me in an attempt to catch you. You'll lead him on a nice little goose chase, hopefully away from me, and I'll sit here and wait until my brothers break me out. By the time I'm with my family, Raphael won't be able to touch me. Don't mess with the Chosen ones and all that._

_That's actually a pretty good plan. _The Voice says in grudging respect.

_Did you ever doubt me?_

_Well, considering you're a big pot of PTSD and drugs? Yes._

_Bastard._

_You love me and you know it. Now back to the plan (Raphael seems to be having a nice little temper tantrum out there, remember?). I'll lay low a while, no drifting with my head among the clouds, if you catch my drift._

_You'll come back, though, right? _

The Voice hesitates._ Right. Wouldn't leave just like that. We're meant to be together, you know...?_

_Eh..._

_Not like that! You humans... I swear, you can be sitting in a room with a pissed archangel wreaking havoc outside and all you think about is girls in tiny bikinis or dudes on the kitchen table doing-_

_I get your point! No need to be so damn graphic about it. Not like you're the one to talk, anyway. _

_I'm wounded. I'm gravely wounded. I'm so wounded I'm going to go off and die now._

_Don't be such a drama queen._

_Ouch. There went my left kidney. Stab me in the heart, why don't you?_

_Focus! What did you mean, we're meant to be?_

Silence.

Outside the screaming reaches new crescendos, the tones mixing with the thundering smatter of the rain and the angry screaming of the wind. In the distance Adam can hear thunder.

_It's hard to explain._

_Show me._

New memories flash forward. He remembers being eternal (big, bright, white and full of light), having thousands of brothers and sisters and a Father who shone more brightly and lovely than anything. He remembers... Oh... _Oh..._

A Vessel_._

No.

_The_ Vessel.

_We're two pieces of one. _Adam realizes.

_Yeah. Depressing thought, right?_

Lightning strikes just outside. They cower further into the corner, scared of a brother that a part of them has never met before.

_Do it! Run! NOW!_

The Voice (which is more of a presence inside his head now that Adam knows he's there and isn't trying to shut him out) hesitates.

_What  
are you waiting for? Run! Fly! Crawl! Do whatever it is you feathery beasts do when you need to flee the battlefield._

Instead of bristling and being offended The Voice is amused.

_My name is Gabriel. _It (he?) says.

And then he's gone.

~*-.-*~

Somewhere, some when, Adam had heard the expression; You don't know what you have until it's gone.

It was one of those boring, philosophical expressions that makes Adam want to barf.

It also fit in pretty well to what he was feeling, because everything was so goddamn empty without his friend (Gabriel, his brother, his missing piece). His empty now, abandoned, and he feels like a banana peel (empty and slippery and in danger of being stepped on).

The storm is over pretty quickly after Gabriel disappears. Apparently Raphael doesn't want to stay for the party.

He's alone again (no voice, mom, friends, house).

He's more levelheaded now (when the drugs have washed out of his system and the angel - whose mind is way too big for a one-seater - is gone)

He's just not sure it matters.

~*-.-*~

In the middle of the night a hands wraps around his mouth, hushing him as he wakes up with a scream on his lips.

"Hush... Be quiet kid," a familiar voice whispers. "We're getting you out of here"

He follows his brother without a word.

~*-.-*~

He wakes up to the sound of arguing.

"You can't just do things like that! John'll have a stroke when he finds out you've kidnapped a fourteen year old boy!"

"I couldn't just leave him! They were hurting him!"

"You Winchesters! One of these days I'm going to shove my old rifle up your asses and shoot some sense into those vacant skulls of yours! You don't bust out a mental patient. You just don't!"

"What was I supposed to do? Go up and tell them; Oh hello, you know that patient down the hall? The one you think murdered that nurse and put Arnold Wilkins in the hospital after burning out his eyes? Well, he isn't crazy, not really. You see, a demon killed his mom and now a couple of them seem to be after him as well, so why don't you let the kid come with me so that I can protect him? I promise I'm not a pedophile, so all's cool!"

"I should throw you out the window with your head first, you know that? Dumbass!"

"It was the right thing to do!"

"It was the stupid thing to do! John's gonna have your hide for this one"

"It was worth it," Dean insists stubbornly.

A surge of warmth heats up Adams chest.

The sound of angry whispers lulls him to sleep.

~*-.-*~

John is older than Adam remembers. Maybe it's because of the week-old beard he's growing or maybe it's the (possibly permanently) hunter-expression his face is stuck on. But the way he walks into the motel room with confident steps is the same tough, tall man Adam met a year ago. He feels intimidating, his face as unreadable as always, and Adam diverts his gaze towards the floor. He's shaking and he can't tell if it's because he's relieved or scared to see John Winchester again.

"Dean," his father's rough voice says in that tone that leaves no room for argument.

His brother opens his mouth but Adam cuts him off.

"8-6-6-9-0-1-3-3-3-6. This is John Winchester. I can't be reached right now. If this is important, leave a message," his voice is trembling slightly as he speaks the words. Even with his eyes glued to the floor, Adam can feel how John freezes up. The silence is tangible, so thick it turns to air into oil. His heart is beating so fast it feels like it's a hummingbird. His scared - oh, so scared - because this is his father (his father who didn't want him, who's legacy turned his mind into duct taped glass shards). This is his father, and the man makes Adam feel like hotbladesscrapinghisskin all over again.

Suddenly there's a hand grasping his chin, forcing his face up so that the hunter can take a good look at the boy. The Hunter's hands are calloused and rough, dirty with gunpowder and tiny flecks of some black Adam wants to believe is oil. The way he grips Adam is soft but firm, desperate almost. Despite that, Adam flinches, tries instinctively to recoil from his touch, but John is stronger and he's stuck. Hard, green eyes peers into his face, scrutinizing every inch of him until he feels naked and flayed.

He can see the exact moment where recognition hits his father's face. It's barely noticeable, a slight widening of his eyes, but Adam has spent so much time together with the Voice (his voice, his Gabriel) that he notices details like that. Gabriel (Gabriel Gabriel Gabriel, he wants to say the name forever, because his brother-in-arms has finally trusted him with his name!) was always good at details.

"Adam?" For a moment he hates the old man, because John (the man who was supposed to be there, the man who's the reason _she _is dead, the reason he's in pieces) didn't even recognize his son's face until he _really_ looked. Okay, so maybe Adam is malnourished and bruised and looking considerably shitter than he did the last time John saw him,_ but that's still no excuse_! (Because dammit, John should be able to recognize his own son!)

He can't find the energy to convey his anger though, because his tired and hungry and (not that he'd ever admit it) scared shitless by all these new people and new places.

He wants Gabriel.

He misses Gabriel.

Who the fuck does Raphael think he can run Gabriel off like that? (Archangel is not a valid answer)

"Dad, you know this kid?" Dean asks. Adam's gaze flitters from the young face of his big brother to the worn face of his father. He can't help but to feel a little bite of satisfaction when he sees John's face close down. _How are you going to explain this one, huh?_ Adam thinks.

John releases his chin and Adam recoils instantly, pulling up his legs and tucking down his face into the space between his knees and chest, wrapping his arms around himself to protect himself. A tiny part of him thinks it's ridiculous, overkill really, to try and make himself so small and scared when Dean is in the room. Dean will protect him, that part whispers. Doesn't matter, the rest of him says, he's delivered his message and now he's done done done done finally done.

"Yes," John says from somewhere above him, his voice rough and hard and don't-mess-with-me-because-I-can-kill-you-with-my-bare-hands. He doesn't elaborate (Is he really that much of a disappointment? How hard can four small words be? _He. Is. My. Son_. Not exactly advanced calculus).

"What's the message then?" the black man wonders.

John is silent for a brief moment.

"He is," he mutters when the moment has passed. "_He_ is" (My son)

There's a faint rustling of clothes.

"Son," John Winchester tells his oldest boy. "There's something you need to know"

~*-.-*~

The rustling of clothes.

The sharp sound of a loading gun.

The smell of gunpowder and anger and Dean's-here-everything's-okay-now.

"Demons," someone sneers.

DemonsDemonsDemonsDemons

"We'll take care of them," his brother grunts.

~*-.-*~

They leave at sunset.

They don't return until dawn.

~*-.-*~

He's scared.

Scared

scared

scared scared scared

scared.

Gabriel is still missing.

He can't breathe.

~*-.-*~

The impala is just like he remembers it. Black. (Somewhat) Shiny. Home-safe-adventure-family.

They dump him in the backseat.

"Aren't you coming?" Dean asks John.

"Take care of your brother," is all John says (judging by the way Dean's jaw clenches, taking care of his _brother _is the last thing he wants).

Dean waits until he's long gone before starting the car.

"Put on your seatbelt," he says without looking back (I don't want you here, his eyes says).

Then he cranks up the radio on highest volume and takes off.

~*-.-*~

They're all the way to Michigan before she catches up with him. He's sitting in the dinner, staring down at his plate of bacon and egg (he considers skipping this meal, but Dean wouldn't like it) while Dean is chatting up the blonde woman two tables down. He has just fired off his I-know-you're-going-to-sleep-with-me-because-I'm-adorable-smirk when the door opens and she steps in.

He recognizes her immediately. She seems even uglier than before (if that's even possible?) and her face is all dark and twisted up, smirks and blood and I'm-going-to-kill-you-now.

He freezes.

Time freezes.

No no no no no.

She's here.

"Bad puppy," she says as she slides into the boot next to him. "Running away like that?" she clicks her tongue mockingly. "You've been a bad puppy, and do you know what happens with bad puppies?" Her smile tells him he isn't going to like this.

He's shaking. His body is shaking. His hands are shaking. His head is shaking furiously.

No no no no no.

She can't be here.

(She is)

Before he can even say a word, she's grabbed his shirt and is dragging him towards the exit (when did she get out of her seat, again?) He follows her like a good little puppy and he's so scared scared scared (terrified) because he's already delivered her message and now he's a liability, a weakness that needs to be eliminated.

He'll follow her like a lamb for slaughter, because he (doesn't) know better. He doesn't fight back.

Dean does.

Before Adam can realize what's going on, a hand has yanked a hold of his much too big hoodie and is yanking him back, making him stumble against the table, and another hand is gripping a firm hold of the former-nurse-turned-ugly-monster's hair and smashes it against one of the guest's newly ordered plate of bacon and egg. The monster shrieks (screams, curses, promises a slow and torturous death) and Dean throws her backwards towards the wall. She smashes her head on the window, making a spider web of cracks appear on the glass.

Dean pulls him away, drags him through the screaming and running towards the kitchens with long, steady steps that Adams struggles to keep up with. He pushes Adam through the door as he turns around and grabs a big can of something (Salt Salt Salt and Burn. A Hunter's funeral he is worthy of).

"Run," he hisses to Adam.

Adam hesitates.

The screaming is turning from horrified to tormented and then it cuts of abruptly. Suddenly everything is silent, too silent, too still, like a nightmare parody of a horror movie.

"Run!" Dean growls. "NOW!"

He's too slow.

The doors bursts open and she's (here here here HERE!) covered in blood, drenched in red (Red that stains his mother's face, red that colors the walls floor kitchen everything) and even her smile is bloodstained, red lines of screaming blood coating her teeth and lips and mouth. She's all black eyes and blood and gore and Oh, is that brain matter in her hair?

"They screamed too loud," she (it) says. It's still grinning wildly, all blood blood blood blood and oh God please help me (Gabriel, Gabriel, you promised, you promised!). It's here and it's here and it's here and Adam's going to die (Slowly, a voice in the back of his head whispers).

Dean raises the can of salt, his hands steady but his eyes burning with hate. "Come on then, you black-eyed son of a bitch!" he growls. "Make my day"

It Laughs. It's a Laugh with a capital L, a Laugh that makes Adam think of black eyes and harsh hands and burning bleeding screaming help please help Gabriel help me please! It's a Laugh that makes him remember not-yet memories of bright light and something crawling into his skin, of burning-drowning in light and heat and purity that's like being carved open and dipped in bleach. It makes him remember falling (falling down the rabbit hole, except there's no wonders in this new land, only pain and suffering and SamLuciferMichaelHurtsHurtsHurtsHurts).

"Dean, Dean, Dean…" the Demon says with a voice that rings so falsely of nice that it makes Adam's ears hurt."No need to be rude. We have no quarrel, you and I. We just want the boy and then you can be on your way, no harm done"

Adam is scared.

Scared. Scared like a little rabbity rabbity rabbit.

There only a couple of feet between the Demon and him. There's only Dean standing in the way, and (this) Dean doesn't want him here, this Dean hates him, wants him (the reminder he is) gone. Dean is not tough, leather, gunpowder, safety, safe, brothers yet. This Dean is angry. This Dean is a stranger.

Adam is scared.

"So what?" Dean asks mockingly. "I'll just walk away and you'll let me? Just like that?"

"Just like that," the Demon says as it smiles charmingly (cruelly). "We just want the boy"

"Why?" Dean asks, his voice hard. "We got the message, no need to kill him to prove a point"

The Demon Laughs (help me help me help Gabriel! Help!). "You think this is about the message?"

"It's not?"

"No. Or well, yes, at first it was, before we realized just how _special _Adam is_"_

Before they realized Gabriel watched over him, Adam realizes. Before they realized an Angel was protecting him (but isn't anymore, because Gabriel is not here, Gabriel is not answering).

Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.

They're going to do nasty things to him. They're going to hurt him so much that what happened (Laughing, crying, black eyes, licking red blood from its fingers) is going to seem like a mosquito bite. They're going to squeeze everything out of him like a wrung out rag. He's going to become (scared-hurt-cold) a vegetable.

Help Gabriel! _Help!_

You promised!

"What do you mean?" Dean sounds suspicious now (He can't know. _Don't tell them anything)_

The Demon smiles so wide that the blood drips of its teeth and runs down it's chin.

"I don't want to hurt you, Dean," (lie) "but I will if I have to. So just do us both a favor and walk away. I get the boy, you get rid of your Father's little slip-up, everybody goes home happy" (except for Adam)

For a moment he's scared that Dean will accept, because he can't see his brother's face and the air is thick and his heart is beating faster than a jet engine and his hands are sweaty and shaking and cold.

"Sure," Dean says in that silky voice that screams trouble. "I'll just leave my little brother-" Adam heart swells. "-in the hands of a psychopathic bitch like you... Hmmm... I don't think so, jackass" And the Demon sneers and flies at him with bared teeth and burning black eyes and Dean makes a quick motion with his hands and it screams as salt burns it to the bone.

"Run, Adam RUN!" Dean shouts as he throws himself at the Demon like a rugby player.

The last thing Adam sees before he runs out the door is his brothers strong hands forcing a screaming head down a meat grinder (because only Dean is crazy enough to shove a pissed off Demon's face down a meat grinder) and then he's out the backdoor and into an empty parking lot.

He hotwires a car (Thank you crazy not-yet memories, thank you!) and tries not to glance through the windows at the massacre.

He leaves the diner (and his brother) without a single glance back.

~*-.-*~

He's not safe anymore.

Gabriel is gone.

Dean is missing (dead?).

Raphael is mad.

The Demons ravages the countryside in a cloud of smoke and sulfur.

He's alone.

(He can't breathe)

~*-.-*~

On the third day he steals a pocketknife from a dark-haired youth with piercings and locks himself in a tiny bathroom that smells like pee. He stares into the mirror and cracked glass, scared eyes, sickness and terror looks back. He takes off his shirt and tries to breathe.

He has to do this.

No one can ever find him again.

Gabriel's memories direct him as he carves the sigils into his ribs.

~*-.-*~

On the seventh day the hallucinations begins.

He curls up in the abandoned warehouse, his face hot with fever and his skin slippery with sweat. He's cold and hot and somewhere deep down he knows that he should have sterilized the knife before he started cutting (and maybe bandaged it with something other than public toilet toilet paper), but it's too late to do something about it now.

_Don't be scared. _His mother whispers soothingly. _We'll be together soon._

She strokes his cheek with hands that doesn't touch.

_We'll find you wherever you go. _The Demon hisses with shining black eyes. _And we'll kill you just like we killed your mommy._

It stinks of darkness and torment.

_I hate you. _Dean says, his handsome face torn up and bleeding. _It's your fault I'm dead. Always your fault. _

Half his face is shredded beyond recognition and Adam cries.

_I never wanted you. _His father growls. _You're a mistake. Mistake. Mistake!_

Blood runs down the floor and builds up to a poodle underneath him.

His hands are red with blood.

_You really think you're special? _Gabriel whispers from the shadows. _What a joke. I left the first chance I got, kid. You were just a decoy so that my big brother would rip me to pieces. _

_We'll find you wherever you go, _The Demon hisses through bloodstained teeth.

_You can't hide from us, Adam._

_We're everywhere._

_~*-.-*~_

There are bugs crawling up his legs, slipping underneath his clothes and into his mouth and nose and ears.

He screams and cries and vomits until he's so tired he can't move.

In his dreams (reality?) the world is made of blood.

~*-.-*~

_Gabriel, _he prays when he lies in a puddle of his own vomit, _I don't know what to do. Please, brother, tell me what to do._

In the bright light of the day, Gabriel whispers back.

_Stand up. Stand up, kid, and start to walk. We have a message to deliver._

He stands.

_~*-.-*~_

He can't remember how he got here. He looks horrible, he knows, and he's sure he smells even worse. His chest is hurting and feels horrible. He's black and blue and a mess of things that's not real and too real and he hurts like hell everywhere, all the time.

Nobody asks who is, but they stare at him with eyes that burn of judgment and pity and _what the hell? _

He's thirteen (fourteen?) years old and he's seen shit that could make any lesser man blow his head off (But not Adam, because Adam's got his brothers), and everyone who stares at him from the corner of their eyes like that can go and screw themselves because they don't know a jack about him (they never will).

He can practically feel their eyebrows rise when he bangs on the door with aching hands.

_What's he doing there? _They wonder. _What's someone like _he_ doing there?_

Screw them. He thinks as the sound of footsteps grows louder.

The door opens.

The world vanishes.

Everything is okay.

Everything is safe.

He's home (safe) now.

The (all too familiar) face stares down at him in confusion.

"Sam," he says.

And that is that.

~*-.-*~

He's Adam.

He's Gabriel's vessel.

He wasn't around the first time (not after Mikey took him for a spin - which ended in fire and brimstone, not heaven and Mom) but he's here now, and even though he's only thirteen (fourteen) and flinches at every sound, he's a bigger player than anyone gives him credit for. And when he finds his Angel (Archangel, suck on that, Zachariah!) they're going to fix it (everything, the apocalypse, their screwed up families) and boy, it's going to be great.

Michael and Lucifer can't have his brother(s) anymore.

He and Gabriel are going to make sure of that.

God can go and screw himself.

The Apocalypse is off the table.

~*-.-*~

**A/N: Hi guys! So, between obsessing over Teen Wolf and totally failing physics, this little piece got itself stuck in my brain and refused to go away until I wrote it down. I hope you guys like it, because I wrote it during the hours I was supposed to... Nah, never mind that. Let's not sully the moment by mentioning homework. I'm already throwing around the idea of a sequel in my head, but I don't know if it'll happen (if it does, it'll probably later rather than sooner). **

**And guys, feel free to share any thoughts or questions (cause, you know, that's what the review button is for).**

**Love, Sunshine and Cookies.**

**~A.C**


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